The Class 43 HST is a legend of the rails, the fastest diesel locomotive to ever operate in the United Kingdom. Since 1975 these powerful Bo-Bo locomotives have moved passengers across the country for business and for leisure, most ironically in their various BR guises. The Class 43 persists to this day as a stalwart of the rails under various operators including the mainline serving GWR, mainline maintaining Network Rail and some private operators such as Locomotive Services Limited on their Blue Pullman services.

This train pack, designed to commemorate the Platinum Jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II depicts the Class 43 as they have never been seen before, in a livery questioning exactly how the legendary LNER would celebrate this special occasion if they were still operating, and nationalisation had never occurred. It would be nice to think that if the big four were never nationalised that we would still be able to see steam regularly on the mainline however this view is shrouded in nostalgia and ignores the operational benefits that diesel locomotives bring. If the LNER operated continuously into the modern era, this may be how they would mark this special occasion.

The power cars in this set, while adorned with numbers that have been assigned to full size units, have had numbers chosen to celebrate prominent years of the queen’s reign. 43052 has been chosen as part of the numbering pattern for the full size examples and 52 for the year of the coronation, and 43022 follows the same pattern but for this very special year of Her Majesties reign.

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